Redress and Reparations should be Expanded to include Japanese from Latin America

Redress and Reparations should be Expanded to include Japanese from Latin America

Background of the Japanese Internment

The World War II played a critical role in the creation of relocation camps in the United States. The attack by the Japanese government on the Pearl Harbour made the United State, through a presidential prerogative to authorize the creation of the Camps in which members of the Japanese, Italian and German descent were relocated a measure of securing the country from its “enemies”. The administration of the United States carried out the activities without considering the citizenry of the people concerned. The United States government also forced the migration of Japanese Latin Americans over to international borders and interned with the rest of the Japanese community (Yamamoto 478). At the camps, people were asked allegiance question in which they were direct to answer yes or no to the question.

The most prominent questions asked was question number twenty-seven (27) which required an answer as to the willingness of the Japanese to serve in the United States army when called upon. Question number twenty-eight demanded that the Japanese swear an unqualified allegiance to the United States and promise to protect its borders from any alien force (Steven et al. 5). People who answered yes were put in a separate camp from those who answered no. The effect of the practice led to the loss of family members and family ties a problem that extended even after the closure of the camps.

More than one hundred thousand Japanese Americans were moved to internment camps despite their protest to the treatment and their citizenship status.  The people in the camps were expected to show loyalty to the United States through assisting in the war efforts (Yamamoto p 478). In some quarters, the citizens of American questioned the conduct of the state for outweighing individual liberty of American of Japanese descent. The 1994 Court ruling in the case of Korematsu v United States further fuelled the discontent felt among American people. In its ruling, the Court stressed that the need to against spying outweighed the individual rights of the people.

The 1980 Committee formed by President Jimmy Carter to investigate the incidence the internment concluded that the government was by racial prejudice and hysteria rather than a legitimate threat to national security (Steven et al.  2). The attack on Pearl Harbour was an excuse to heighten the already shaky relationship between Japanese American and the government. It thus sought for a quick “legitimate” excuse to advance its racial activities against the Americans of Japanese descent. The traces of this hatred are manifested by the passing of laws that prevented Japanese American born in Japan (the Issei) from becoming citizens (Steven et al.  2). Further, the law prevented them from owning land, wedding American citizens or holding certain jobs. The laws were passed long before the World War II began. In the aftermath of the investigations, Congress issued an apology and awarded twenty thousand dollars for each survivor of the internment camp (Steven et al.  2).

Introduction

Reparation is a basic maxim of law that demands that harms that people undergo in a jurisdictional setting should be remedied. The issue of reparation and redress to wrongdoing against persons is a well-established norm in the international plane and local jurisdictions. Reparation and remedy is a legal right under international law (Roht-Arriaza 157). In its formulation, the reparations are offered where the rights of individuals have been violated or where the government contravenes humanitarian practices that guide the engagement at the international level (Roht-Arriaza 157).

In 1989, the United Nation Sub-Commission on the Prevention and Protection of Minorities currently the Sub-Commission of Human right moved to codify the right to reparation. Draft principles were developed and presented to the Commission on Human Rights at the 1994 session, but the Commission was apprehensive of the scope of the state obligation under the draft principles. However, after several deliberative seminars and meetings, the draft was adopted.  The legal basis of reparation is human rights instruments that recognize the right of the people to an effective remedy before international and national tribunals and courts. The notion is founded on the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Several human rights instrument have incorporated the right into their articles.

Reparation cases have increased over the years with several people filing cases against states on matters that happened a long time ago to be redressed accordingly. The infiltration of the cases has only worked to further the already hot debate on the limit and extent of reparation. The debate has elicited mixed reaction from the people who see the benefits of reparation as a core practice in restorative justice. Anti-reparation normally views it as an economic problem aimed at impeding the development progress in the country. Despite the debates, reparation practices have since been entrenched into the legal system of the world.

The internment of the Japanese by the US government ended up with the government offering apology for the acts and awarding monetary compensation to Japanese-Americans. The compensation did not cover the Japanese from the Latin America, who also underwent the gross violation of their rights. Therefore, this paper proposes that the reparation should be extended to include Japanese from Latin America because of the following reasons.

The United States should offer reparation as a means of making amends for the international obligation it owes other states and the community of human beings. In doing so, the government will be responding to the actual threat that the actions of internment has imposed on the community of Japanese in Latin America. The United States government should offer monetary compensation to the Latin America Japanese community as a show of commitment against human right violation and non-discriminatory principle. Selective compensation is not good for the image of the country as it portrays hypocritical tendencies.

Remedies to the Japanese in Latin America will strengthen the procedural ways in which rights and obligations are enforced or which the imminent violation of the right is precluded or redressed (Laplante 357).   The suffering that the internment imposed on the community brought financial losses and loss of time which should be adequately catered for by the United States government as a means of restoring them to their original position (Roht-Arriaza 158). Failure to accord reparation to the Japanese in the Latin America will be seen as a way of legitimizing the internment actions.

The purpose of this paper is to discuss the importance of reparation and redress as a means of achieving cohesion within the world communities and the nation. The main focus of the paper will focus on the reparation of the Japanese-Americans and why the reparation should be extended to include Japanese from Latin America. The paper also offers a summary of the development of the concept of reparation and how it has changed the international relations and its role in the development of international law.

Need to Expand Redress to Cover Latin America Japanese

a.      Reparation as a Social Cohesion Tool

Reparation is an important tool in achieving cohesion within the societal setting. It, therefore, concerns the fundamental precepts of social justice. It reflects an agreement by the community that they agree to the evil nature of the redressed suffering. In doings so, reparation achieves cohesive community by mending the bridge between the oppressed and the oppressor. In ensuring that reparation works to achieve this cohesive goal, all stakeholders must ensure that coordinated efforts are adopted towards correcting the chronic fragmentation that might occur in tribal or racial lines. The nature of reparation demand that all concerned should participate in the true spirit of mending the community since the oppressed, or the oppressor alone cannot achieve this goal.

Despite the existence of reparation, it is still unclear whether it can really achieve the goals that it has been set to meet. One of the factors and pertinent question to ask is whether the view of the society towards the people who receive reparation as remedy actually changes for the better. The answer to the question is affirmative “ NO”. To begin with, reparation payment is a legal coercion that the Courts impose on the state to remedy the wrongdoing that at the time of happening was considered “legal.” However, according Posner and Adrian (692) reparation that is Court ordered defeats the purpose of reparation and thus collapses the subject of reparation. In essence, reparation in as much as it is legally recognized in legal instruments, its exercise should be aligned to morals and conscience. The stand of Posner et al. however fail to conform with the realities as most reparation orders come from the Courts and tribunals that are specifically formed to determine the matter. As such the view of the society cannot change just because a certain group has been given reparation. Achieving a cohesive nation requires more than offering reparation to the persons affected.

Achieving a cohesive society requires a positive attitude change in order to allow for the development of civil liberties. The institutions should also be reformed to reflect that commitment of the country towards ensuring national security. The granting of reparation and remedies makes the nation understand the nature of the actions as they occurred at treat them as a possible source of conflict capable of plunging the country into social breakdowns.

The existence of reparation is to restore a person to a position in which he was before the violations occurred. In most of the reparation cases, they tend to be backdated. In this sense, they are always brought before Court when there is a total change of regime and institutions. Essentially, reparations can work to adjust individual attitude towards historical injustices without giving the current consideration to the fundamental realities of power. Accordingly reparation claims tend to create victimhood in the mind of the people who think back of the suffering they underwent thus triggering regressive reactions.

Despite the existence of the critiques, reparation is an essential tool in achieving political, social and economic goal thus creating cohesiveness, the first aspect of reparation is that it restores a person to his financial position of person and thus allows for the continuance of material gain. Further, the granting of reparation is an important factor in sending a political message in view of its commitment to the principles of equality.

b.      Ethical Theories of Reparation

The basis of the theory of reparation is to provide an explanation as to why the government should make a group of people to pay another group despite the latter group, or their descendants or relation, not having a prior legal right against the first group. Reparations have three components of relationship (Posner & Adrian p 698). The first engagement is between the original offender and the victim. The second relationship is between the original wrongdoer and the potential payer of the reparations. The last engagement is between the primary victim and the likely claimant or recipient of reparations. In approaching the Court, the claimant must show cause and proper type of the relationship.

The relationship also depicts two separate moral questions which concern moral obligation giving rise to the reparation and the nature of the entity that can hear the moral obligation (Posner & Adrian p 699). The two components allow the Court or the tribunal to make findings based on the moral and legal obligation as required by the practice. A proper understanding between the two concepts is imperative in helping the Courts and the Tribunal decide the case before them.

c.       Reparation as Means to Develop International Law

The main of objective of international law is to have all countries adhere to the laid down norms of international practices. International practices include the principles and customary international law practices that govern the relationship between countries and between countries and the world citizenry or populace. In achieving the goal, the International Courts and Tribunals, national courts and tribunals together with other bodies aimed to protect human rights violation shall be rendered obsolete. In this setting of full compliance by the Country, the court will have served its main purpose thus making it irrelevant to the jurisdictional setting both locally and internationally. However, the goal to render the Courts obsolete is a distant one; it presents a utopian world that cannot exist due to the different view of the world, different ways of interpreting laws and the inconsistent interest within the world community. However, the impracticability of the goal should not deter the works that are aimed taking the Court in its direction.

Reparation is an evolving phenomenon in the field of law. It arises as a general right to recognizable remedy in international law. The nature of reparation can be described as “restorative” since it makes good the bad that were suffered in the past for wrongful acts and omissions on the part of the state (Mize Jr 18). The role that reparation plays in this respect is deterrence for future repetition of such actions or omission. Offering reparation to the victims is a critical way of ensuring that states comply with their obligations under international law.

The Japanese in the Latin-America underwent human violations that are contrary to the international human rights and humanitarian instruments (Steven, Glen Burnie High, & Anne Arundel County Public Schools 7). Therefore, offering them the reparation shall act as an important step toward achieving a smooth development of international law. The application of the law will be uniform thus making the jurisprudence behind reparation to be strong and consistent in its application. Failure to grant reparation to a situation that is somewhat similar to the internment of the Japanese America would hurt the cohesiveness of the law and obligations required of states to comply with international practices and norms. Further, granting reparation to Japanese in the Latin America would help in the development of customary international practices and norms. The effect of reparations on international law development can, therefore, not be understated.

However, the granting of reparation does not guarantee cohesiveness in the international laws and practices. In most cases, the Court applies strict compensatory rationale that normally makes reparation seem linked with the harm that the victim underwent (Bradford p 11). For instance, a state may pay the reparations as ordered by the Court but still fail in ensuring effective remedies to human rights violation within its jurisdiction. The development of the law should be such that the mere sanctioning of the violation should make a state change its internal practices. The states should be duty bound in the moral and legal sense to offer reparations and not drag their feet until the Courts make a ruling (Ogletree Jr 281). The possibility of attaining the goal is however oblique. The main aspect of that makes it an impossibility is the economic status of the nations and the large sums of monetary remedies that reparations often command. Further, very few states can operate in the breadth of morality. The reparation laws have not found the political goodwill to mature.

Despite, the stumbling blocks that have faced the development of reparation laws, there is a need to ensure that the human rights protection at the international plane become a living reality (Bradford 19). In this sense, justice should not be spoken but must be done and be seen to be done. Failure to grant reparations to the Japanese in the Latin America will create a legal lacuna in the global human rights and humanitarian treaties. These instruments operate on the basis of equality and non-discrimination that underlies the diverse nature of the world community and tolerance of race (Tsosie 9).

The United States government should undertake to see that the Japanese of Latin America are well compensated due to the need to have a cohesive community (Ogletree Jr 285). The argument however does not offer any form of legal backing. It trickles down to the morality of the state and the commitment that a particular state have towards a peaceful multi-racial world community. The racial abuses have been one of the main problems that the world community has been contending with for the past decades since before the advent of the nations. The unity of the nations and the development of laws seeking to dehumanize racial abuses have not borne fruits. Racial abuses still trouble the world community (Tsosie, p 9). Reparation of the victims of racial target is one of the ways in which nations can show their dedication to the fight against racism. Therefore, ensuring the fight against racism continues there is a need to have the Japanese in the Latin America remedied for their treatment in the hands of the United States. The United States must also prove in action that it is committed to a peaceful world as enumerated in the preamble of the United Nations Charter.

Recommendations

The contemporary developments in the international law plane are an aspect that requires close attention. There is a need for engagements at the international level in view of synchronizing the practice of reparation with the economic realities of the world states. The governments should pull their resources together to finding common ground and a more uniform ad elaborate practice about reparation and redress of the victims of state actions and omission. The United States should, therefore, develop a framework of engaging the Japanese in Latin America in order to find a balance between their needs and the economic realities of the United States.

The United States should develop proper and reliable policies that aim to strengthen the principles and practices expected of them at the international plane. In this respect, compensation should include all the Japanese community and not only the Japanese American, The continued globalization of the world does not allow for a state to operate singly without considering the consequences of its actions. The policies developed must be reflective of the goals and realities of the international law with regard to human rights instruments and humanitarian instruments.

The nations should also adopt practices that promote human rights within their borders and outside their borders. This would set an environment for proper engagement between the Latin America Japanese the United States government. Further,  it will make the development of the law fairly uniform thus creating a reliable jurisprudence about human rights abuse remedies and reparations.

There is a need for the United Nations and other stakeholders to enhance capacity building forums that aim to educate the affected Japanese of their rights and obligations at the local and international level. Capacity building should involve teachings on access to the Courts and processes of seeking remedies for harm suffered. Further, the forums should equip the world community with the knowledge of Statutes of Limitation that will act as a guide on when to institute a claim.

The United States should adopt a legal morality approach in matters of human rights abuses without necessarily waiting upon the Court to give ruling. The effect of the legal morality approach is that it will save time and finances. Therefore, it allows the nation to concentrate on other matters of development instead of spending a lot of resources trying to disprove its liability. The approach can also help in the attainment of the goals of the Court, which is to be rendered obsolete.

In a narrow form, the United States of America should consider remedying the Japanese of Latin-America as show of solidarity with the international laws and human rights. In doing so, the United States will have saved the moral and legal questioning as to its commitment in advancing human rights according to its Constitution.

Conclusion

Reparation and redress for the harm committed against the Japanese in Latin America is an important component in the society of nations. It will set out a good example towards the desired change of a peaceful world. Reparation to the Japanese in Latin America will offer the needed impetus in the jurisprudential development of international law in view of reparation and redress practices As noted earlier, the law regarding reparation although inscribed in the right to remedy is still a young area of law which still need proper development. The Japanese Latin America situation offers that opportunity. The consistency of reparation in the international plane has made it a norm of a customary practice acceptable by the world community and thus failure to grant reparation to Japanese community in the Latin America will jeopardize this position. To this end, it would prove morally acceptable and legally binding to have the Japanese of Latin America compensated accordingly just like their counterparts whom the Congress compensated. Further, it will serve the good image of the United States and show that they are truly committed to fights against violation of human rights.

Works Cited

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